Autumn Sun

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Speaker 1 The holidays can be a lot, can't they?

Speaker 1 For business owners, especially, this time of year can go from cozy to chaotic. Fast.

Speaker 1 I remember my first holiday rush. I was so worried something would break.
The website, the checkout, my own brain.

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Speaker 1 Whether you're just opening your virtual doors or you're running a full-blown store, Shopify helps you take the holidays from chaos to cha-ching.

Speaker 1 There are thousands of templates and tools to make your your site beautiful and functional.

Speaker 1 AI tools to help write product descriptions and headlines, and built-in marketing support so your voice doesn't get lost in the noise.

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Speaker 1 Sign up for your free trial today at shopify.com/slash nothing much.

Speaker 1 That's shopify.com/slash nothing nothing much.

Speaker 1 Welcome

Speaker 1 to bedtime stories for everyone

Speaker 1 in which

Speaker 1 nothing much happens.

Speaker 1 You feel good

Speaker 1 and then you fall asleep.

Speaker 1 I'm Catherine Nikolai.

Speaker 1 I write and read all the stories you hear on Nothing Much Happens.

Speaker 1 Audio Engineering is is by Bob Wittersheim.

Speaker 1 We give to a different charity each week, and this week we are giving to Four Paws International.

Speaker 1 Their vision is a world where humans treat animals with respect, empathy, and understanding.

Speaker 1 Learn more in our show notes.

Speaker 1 Villagers, we have something very special and very cozy coming your way next week. It's a partnership with a brand who understands the importance of mindfulness and taking care of yourself.

Speaker 1 I've fallen in love with their products and use them myself to feel grounded and calm. And I can't wait to share what we've worked on together.

Speaker 1 Stay tuned to our social channels and right here on all of our shows. for the exciting launch of your future favorite soothing thing.

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 I have a tried and true method for helping you sleep better tonight and also build consistently better sleep over time.

Speaker 1 We need to engage your brain just enough.

Speaker 1 We want it to stay in one place.

Speaker 1 to quit its wandering ways for a bit. And the story is the way to do that.

Speaker 1 Just by listening will shift your brain into its task positive mode

Speaker 1 and that will make falling asleep easier and probably instant.

Speaker 1 Be patient if you are new to this. It is a form of brain training and will improve with regular use.

Speaker 1 I'll tell the story twice and I'll go a little slower the second time through.

Speaker 1 If you wake later in the night, turn a story on and you'll drop right back off.

Speaker 1 Our story tonight is called Autumn Sun.

Speaker 1 And it's a story about a day at Weather Vane Farm,

Speaker 1 trading the animals to autumnal enrichment.

Speaker 1 It's also about light shifting through orange and red leaves, the pillowy soil of a well-tilled garden, the last pumpkins picked from their vines,

Speaker 1 and the simple joy of watching kids play.

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 slide down into your sheets,

Speaker 1 switch off your light,

Speaker 1 and take a moment to feel your whole body

Speaker 1 relaxing into the bed

Speaker 1 the day is done

Speaker 1 whatever you did with it

Speaker 1 it was enough

Speaker 1 truly you did enough today

Speaker 1 all is well

Speaker 1 take a slow deep breath in through your nose

Speaker 1 and sigh from your mouth

Speaker 1 again. Breathe in

Speaker 1 and release.

Speaker 1 Good

Speaker 1 autumn sun.

Speaker 1 The autumn was lovely and lasting this year.

Speaker 1 So many trees

Speaker 1 were still full of bright leaves

Speaker 1 and many others had only begun to turn.

Speaker 1 I hoped it would mean we would have a month or more yet to enjoy it.

Speaker 1 And the skies were so blue

Speaker 1 it felt like Mother Nature was clearing away the clouds

Speaker 1 to let the sun shine brightly on the leaves,

Speaker 1 reminding us to look

Speaker 1 and to marvel.

Speaker 1 I certainly did.

Speaker 1 The way the sun filtered through the branches,

Speaker 1 it reminded me of the sparkle of light on a lake on a clear day.

Speaker 1 It dazzled me,

Speaker 1 and I looked to be dazzled at least once a day.

Speaker 1 With all this sunlight,

Speaker 1 even the days that started off chilly,

Speaker 1 warmed in the afternoon.

Speaker 1 And when I was working out in the barn or in the meadow,

Speaker 1 I was often down to my t-shirt and overalls after lunch.

Speaker 1 The animals were enjoying this fall as much, if not more, than I was.

Speaker 1 The ducks and geese splashed and floated in the pond all day,

Speaker 1 or slept in rows on the grassy banks.

Speaker 1 Did you know ducks can snore?

Speaker 1 I sure knew it.

Speaker 1 The cows we had a small small herd of rescues now,

Speaker 1 sunbathed and chewed the golden days away,

Speaker 1 watching the goats in the next paddock over

Speaker 1 as they jumped off the donated kids' playground equipment

Speaker 1 and occasionally got their heads stuck in bales of hay or fence posts.

Speaker 1 The goats were voted most likely to cause trouble when no one is looking, though

Speaker 1 they still caused plenty when we were.

Speaker 1 We also had a few pigs,

Speaker 1 a stable full of the sweetest donkeys you've ever met,

Speaker 1 and a few odds and ends,

Speaker 1 a lone llama,

Speaker 1 two emus who gave the goats a run for their money,

Speaker 1 sometimes literally,

Speaker 1 a miniature horse, barn cats,

Speaker 1 three turkeys,

Speaker 1 and slightly more dogs than strictly made sense.

Speaker 1 But every one got food and fresh water, saw the doctor regularly,

Speaker 1 had clean stalls or beds to settle in at night,

Speaker 1 and got a lot of love and affection.

Speaker 1 We'd not set out to be an animal sanctuary.

Speaker 1 It had sort of crept up on us,

Speaker 1 but we wouldn't have it any other way.

Speaker 1 We had a small army of volunteers who helped us care for the critter crew every day

Speaker 1 and they were as much our family now as the animals were.

Speaker 1 In fact, some came here for Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1 We would add all the leaves to the dining-room table

Speaker 1 and have a big potluck

Speaker 1 and share some special treats with the animals.

Speaker 1 Today I was preparing some of those treats, in fact, or picking them rather.

Speaker 1 I'd grown a giant pumpkin patch on the far side of the barn behind the farmhouse,

Speaker 1 and we still had a few dozen sitting on their vines.

Speaker 1 I took my trusty wheelbarrow and rolled it through the dry grass.

Speaker 1 Gosh, it smelled so good out today.

Speaker 1 That sweet hay scent of the grass at the end of its life.

Speaker 1 The leaves baking in the sun.

Speaker 1 I filled my lungs with it as I turned toward the patch.

Speaker 1 and parked my barrow by the edge of the garden.

Speaker 1 It is a specific sense memory that I have

Speaker 1 that kicks in each time I step onto the well-tilled soil

Speaker 1 of walking through my grandfather's garden as a child.

Speaker 1 His garden soil

Speaker 1 was almost pillowy,

Speaker 1 and each step held a moment of sinking and a moment of bounce

Speaker 1 as my foot lifted for the next.

Speaker 1 I smiled,

Speaker 1 proud to have inherited his green thumb and soil aeration skills.

Speaker 1 I took some snippers from the roomy chest pocket on my overalls

Speaker 1 and began to snip away pumpkins from their prickly stems.

Speaker 1 I balanced them as best as I could in the wagon,

Speaker 1 the biggest on the bottom,

Speaker 1 and the smaller ones on the top,

Speaker 1 till it was about as full as I thought I could manage on the uneven ground

Speaker 1 As I wheeled it back across the barnyard toward the goats play area

Speaker 1 I noticed the shadow the weather vane made on the bare earth

Speaker 1 There was almost no wind today

Speaker 1 so it was still

Speaker 1 and the shape of the crane and arrows that sat up on the roof ridge

Speaker 1 was repeated in a slight blur at my feet.

Speaker 1 One of our dogs was stretched out in the shadow.

Speaker 1 He was a husky,

Speaker 1 and I could tell he was eager for the first snow to come,

Speaker 1 for colder days days to set in.

Speaker 1 Frigo was his name,

Speaker 1 and he was the kind of dog

Speaker 1 that would lay on the last patch of ice in the yard as spring came on.

Speaker 1 By now, he'd had enough of the warm weather

Speaker 1 and was taking refuge in this one shady spot in the open yard.

Speaker 1 I stopped to give him a pat

Speaker 1 and promise him

Speaker 1 that

Speaker 1 the winter weather would come soon.

Speaker 1 Like most huskies, he liked to talk, and even more, to talk back, so he had a few things to say about that.

Speaker 1 Oh, Frigo, I said with sympathy as I reached for the handles of the barrow and started off again.

Speaker 1 His whiny howls were setting off George the donkey, who brayed back from his yard.

Speaker 1 Oh, please, I chuckled invitingly, let's all express ourselves. Where's the rooster? Sonny?

Speaker 1 I spotted him pecking around the side of the coop.

Speaker 1 He was an older gentleman, who I think could barely see, but he knew his name

Speaker 1 and let out a squeaky crow.

Speaker 1 Need some oil on those gears, my friend,

Speaker 1 I mumbled. as I manoeuvred my load of pumpkins around to the gate of the goat's yard.

Speaker 1 I needed to get in without all of them getting out.

Speaker 1 So I picked up one of the smaller pumpkins and held it up to get their attention.

Speaker 1 They watched me, several of them still chewing on hay or grass, and I called out to them about the many virtues of pumpkins, how delicious they were,

Speaker 1 how fun they were to step on and head-butt.

Speaker 1 I did a couple fake-out throws,

Speaker 1 pretending to toss it into one corner or another,

Speaker 1 and they

Speaker 1 did not react like the dogs

Speaker 1 who would have been running back and forth,

Speaker 1 trying to find the disappearing pumpkins.

Speaker 1 The goats just watched me, and I started to lose confidence that my plan was going to work.

Speaker 1 Here goes nothing, I mumbled,

Speaker 1 as I tossed the gourd for real now, as far out to the back of their yard as I could manage.

Speaker 1 It somehow landed on top of one of their play structures.

Speaker 1 They watched it wobble at the top edge of a slide,

Speaker 1 turning their heads as if looking first with one eye and then with the other.

Speaker 1 Finally, it toppled

Speaker 1 and slid squeakily down the slant.

Speaker 1 And as it hit the ground below,

Speaker 1 lovely and overripe as it was,

Speaker 1 it broke open.

Speaker 1 The goats lost their minds at this.

Speaker 1 They ran over.

Speaker 1 Some of the younger ones ran through the seeds and pumpkin flesh.

Speaker 1 Others climbed up to slide down over it.

Speaker 1 It was my cue to open their gate and rush in with the rest, quickly closing it behind me.

Speaker 1 I started tossing the pumpkins in all different directions.

Speaker 1 Some cracked as they came down,

Speaker 1 and others bounced. And I knew the kids would be playing all afternoon with these new toys.

Speaker 1 I backed out as I'd come in, careful not to step on a passing cat or trip over the llama asleep in the sun.

Speaker 1 My life was a little silly here on Weathervane Farm.

Speaker 1 But I loved it.

Speaker 1 And I think

Speaker 1 they all did too.

Speaker 1 Autumn Sun

Speaker 1 The autumn was lovely

Speaker 1 and lasting this year.

Speaker 1 So many trees were still full of bright leaves,

Speaker 1 and many others had only begun to turn.

Speaker 1 I hoped it would mean

Speaker 1 we would have a month or more yet

Speaker 1 to enjoy it.

Speaker 1 When the skies were so blue,

Speaker 1 it felt like Mother Nature was clearing away the clouds

Speaker 1 to let the sun shine brightly on the leaves,

Speaker 1 reminding us

Speaker 1 to look and to marvel.

Speaker 1 I certainly did.

Speaker 1 The way the sun

Speaker 1 filtered through the branches

Speaker 1 reminded me

Speaker 1 of the sparkle of light on a lake on a clear day.

Speaker 1 It dazzled me,

Speaker 1 and I looked to be dazzled

Speaker 1 at least once a day.

Speaker 1 With all this sunlight,

Speaker 1 even the days that started off chilly

Speaker 1 warmed in the afternoon.

Speaker 1 And when I was working out in the barn or in the meadow,

Speaker 1 I was often down to my t-shirt and overalls after lunch.

Speaker 1 The animals were enjoying this fall

Speaker 1 as much, if not more, than I was.

Speaker 1 The ducks and geese splashed and floated in the pond all day,

Speaker 1 or slept in rows on the grassy banks.

Speaker 1 Did you know ducks can snore?

Speaker 1 Phew, I sure knew it.

Speaker 1 The cows,

Speaker 1 we had a small herd of rescues now,

Speaker 1 sunbathed and chewed the golden days away,

Speaker 1 watching the goats in the next paddock over

Speaker 1 as they jumped off the donated kids' playground equipment

Speaker 1 and occasionally got their heads stuck in bales of hay

Speaker 1 or fence posts.

Speaker 1 They were voted

Speaker 1 most

Speaker 1 likely to cause trouble when no one is looking,

Speaker 1 though they also caused plenty when we were.

Speaker 1 We also had a few pigs,

Speaker 1 a stable

Speaker 1 full of the sweetest donkeys you've ever met,

Speaker 1 and a few odds and ends,

Speaker 1 a lone llama,

Speaker 1 two emus

Speaker 1 who gave the goats a run for their money, sometimes literally,

Speaker 1 a miniature horse,

Speaker 1 barn cats,

Speaker 1 three turkeys, turkeys,

Speaker 1 and slightly more dogs than strictly made sense.

Speaker 1 But everyone got food and fresh water,

Speaker 1 saw the doctor regularly,

Speaker 1 had clean stalls or beds to settle in at night,

Speaker 1 and a lot of love and affection.

Speaker 1 We'd not set out to be an animal sanctuary.

Speaker 1 It had sort of crept up on us,

Speaker 1 but

Speaker 1 we wouldn't have it any other way.

Speaker 1 We had a small army of volunteers

Speaker 1 who helped us care for the critter crew every day

Speaker 1 and they were as much our family now

Speaker 1 as the animals were

Speaker 1 in fact

Speaker 1 some came here for thanksgiving

Speaker 1 We would add all the leaves to the dining room table

Speaker 1 and have a big pot pot luck

Speaker 1 and share some special treats with the animals.

Speaker 1 Today I was preparing some of those treats in fact

Speaker 1 or picking them rather.

Speaker 1 I'd grown a giant pumpkin patch on the far side of the barn

Speaker 1 behind the farmhouse

Speaker 1 And we still had a few dozen sitting on their vines.

Speaker 1 I took my trusty wheelbarrow and rolled it through the dry grass.

Speaker 1 Gosh, it smelled so good out today.

Speaker 1 The sweet hay scent of the grass at the end of its life,

Speaker 1 the leaves baking in the sun.

Speaker 1 I filled my lungs with it

Speaker 1 as I turned toward the patch,

Speaker 1 parked my barrow by the edge of the garden.

Speaker 1 It is a specific sense memory

Speaker 1 I have

Speaker 1 that still kicks in each time

Speaker 1 I step onto the well-tilled soil

Speaker 1 of walking through my grandfather's garden as a child.

Speaker 1 His garden's soil

Speaker 1 was almost

Speaker 1 pillowy,

Speaker 1 and each step

Speaker 1 held a moment of sinking

Speaker 1 and a moment of bounce

Speaker 1 as my foot lifted for the next

Speaker 1 I smiled

Speaker 1 proud to have inherited

Speaker 1 his green thumb

Speaker 1 and

Speaker 1 soil aeration skills

Speaker 1 I took some snippers from the roomy chest pocket on my overalls

Speaker 1 and began to snip away pumpkins from their prickly stems.

Speaker 1 I balanced them

Speaker 1 as best I could in the wagon,

Speaker 1 the biggest on the bottom

Speaker 1 and the smaller ones on the top,

Speaker 1 till

Speaker 1 it was about as full as I thought I could manage

Speaker 1 on the uneven ground.

Speaker 1 As I wheeled it back across the barnyard

Speaker 1 toward the goat's play area,

Speaker 1 I noticed the shadow the weather vane made on the bare earth.

Speaker 1 There was almost no wind today,

Speaker 1 so it was still,

Speaker 1 and the shape of the crane

Speaker 1 and arrows that sat up on the roof ridge

Speaker 1 was repeated in a slight blur at my feet.

Speaker 1 One of our dogs was stretched out in the shadow.

Speaker 1 He was a husky,

Speaker 1 and I could tell he was eager

Speaker 1 for the first snow to come,

Speaker 1 for colder days to set in.

Speaker 1 Frigo was his name,

Speaker 1 and he was the kind of dog

Speaker 1 that would lay on the last patch of ice in the yard as spring came on.

Speaker 1 By now,

Speaker 1 he'd had enough of the warm weather

Speaker 1 and was taking refuge in this one shady spot in the open yard.

Speaker 1 I stopped to give him a pat

Speaker 1 and promise him that the winter would come soon.

Speaker 1 Like most Huskies,

Speaker 1 he liked to talk,

Speaker 1 and, even more,

Speaker 1 to talk back.

Speaker 1 So he had a few things to say about that.

Speaker 1 Oh, Frigo,

Speaker 1 I said with sympathy

Speaker 1 as I reached for the handles of the wheelbarrow

Speaker 1 and started off again,

Speaker 1 his whiny howls were setting off George the donkey,

Speaker 1 who brayed back from his yard.

Speaker 1 Oh,

Speaker 1 please, I chuckled invitingly,

Speaker 1 let's all express ourselves. Where's the rooster?

Speaker 1 Sonny

Speaker 1 I spotted him pecking around the side of the coop.

Speaker 1 He was an older gentleman

Speaker 1 who I think could barely see,

Speaker 1 but he knew his name and let out a squeaky crow.

Speaker 1 Need some oil on those gears, my friend.

Speaker 1 I mumbled as I maneuvered my load of pumpkins around to the gate of the goat's yard.

Speaker 1 I needed to get in without all of them getting out.

Speaker 1 So I picked up another one of the smaller pumpkins

Speaker 1 and held it up to get their attention.

Speaker 1 They watched me,

Speaker 1 several of them still chewing on hay and grass.

Speaker 1 And I called out to them

Speaker 1 about the many virtues of pumpkins.

Speaker 1 How delicious they were.

Speaker 1 How fun they were to step on

Speaker 1 and head-butt.

Speaker 1 I did a couple fake out throws,

Speaker 1 pretending to toss it

Speaker 1 into one corner or another.

Speaker 1 And they

Speaker 1 did not react like the dogs would have,

Speaker 1 who would have been running back

Speaker 1 and forth,

Speaker 1 trying to find disappearing pumpkins.

Speaker 1 The goats just watched me,

Speaker 1 and I started to lose confidence

Speaker 1 that my plan was going to work.

Speaker 1 Here goes nothing,

Speaker 1 I mumbled,

Speaker 1 as I tossed the gourd for real now,

Speaker 1 as far out

Speaker 1 to the back of their yard as I could manage.

Speaker 1 It somehow landed on the top of one of their play structures.

Speaker 1 They watched it wobble at the edge of a slide,

Speaker 1 turning their heads as if looking

Speaker 1 first with one eye and then with the other.

Speaker 1 Finally, it toppled

Speaker 1 and slid squeakily down the slant.

Speaker 1 And as it hit the ground,

Speaker 1 lovely and overripe as it was,

Speaker 1 it broke open.

Speaker 1 The goats

Speaker 1 lost their minds at this.

Speaker 1 They ran over.

Speaker 1 Some of the younger ones ran through the seeds and pumpkin flesh.

Speaker 1 Others climbed up to slide down over it.

Speaker 1 It was my cue to open their gate and rush in with the rest.

Speaker 1 quickly closing it behind me.

Speaker 1 i started tossing the pumpkins

Speaker 1 in all different directions

Speaker 1 some cracked as they came down

Speaker 1 and others bounced

Speaker 1 and i knew the kids would be playing

Speaker 1 all afternoon with these new toys

Speaker 1 I backed out

Speaker 1 as I'd come in,

Speaker 1 careful not to step on a passing cat

Speaker 1 or trip over the llama asleep in the sun.

Speaker 1 My life was a little silly

Speaker 1 here on Weather Vane Farm,

Speaker 1 but I loved it.

Speaker 1 And I think

Speaker 1 they all did too.

Speaker 1 Sweet dreams.